76 THE KAYAN, KEN YAH AND KALABIT 
corresponds to our idea of the “Garden of Eden”. They 
the i attacked the Kalabits, who were living in the 
head waters of the Baram and Bahau rivers and 
drove them down-river towards the Sarawak Coast. 
Then came the Kayan invasion also from the Celebes 
which passed through the Kenyahs, Leppu Buau and 
Leppu Poun, in the Ulu Baram and tributaries, came 
down the main-river pushing the Kalabit away in the 
plateaux of the Tutau and Baram rivers and the re¬ 
maining Leppu Poun into the side streams. The 
Kayans to this day live principally in the main-river, 
and the Kenyahs and Kalabits as stated. 
All this intermixing has naturally caused a certain 
amount of assimilation in the language, but sufficient 
remains to show their different origin, certainly in 
Kayan and Kalabit. The Kenyah language which I 
have selected is that spoken by the Leppu Buau, 
amongst whom are included Leppu Tau, Leppu Jingan, 
Leppu Annan and Leppu Sawa, and not that spoken 
by the Ivalamantan Leppu Poun. 
The Kayan and Kalabit dialects differ very slightly 
amongst the different tribes, not nearly as much as the 
difference between Devonshire and Somerset. 
There are a certain number of Malayan words in 
these languages such as ‘takut’, ‘lengan’, ‘bulan’ and 
others which seem really to belong to the languages, 
and are not recent importations due to intercourse 
with Malay traders ; others have been and are still 
being introduced through the paucity of words to do 
with trade and the needs of civilisation. Kayans 
curiously are very bad linguists and by far the greater 
number of them can hardly understand a word of 
Malay, hence their language is much purer than that 
of the Kenyahs, who are very quick at picking up 
languages, and it is quite common in a Kenyah house 
to be able to converse in Malay or Dayak even, with 
the women. Kalabits are still untouched by any 
Malay influence. 
In pronounciation and spelling I have followed as 
much as possible, the rules laid down by authorities 
on Malay, 
